The Los Angeles Clippers finished last season with a 42-40 record, good enough for 10th place in the Western Conference. After a quiet offseason and in the improved West, what is the Clippers’ ceiling for the 2018-19 season?
Coming into the 2018-19 season, there is certainly reason for optimism for fans of the Los Angeles Clippers. They are a team with a great mix of young talent along with proven veterans.
Tobias Harris established himself as a legitimate NBA star, averaging 19.3 points per game in 32 games with the team. Arguably the most impressive aspect of his improvement was his 3-point percentage, as the young man shot 41.4 percent from deep last season with Detroit and L.A.
The Clippers were decimated by injuries last year. Avery Bradley played just six games after being traded from Detroit and missed the rest of the year to have surgery to repair his adductor and rectus abdominis muscles. Newly signed free agent Danilo Gallinari played just 21 games, and starting point guard Patrick Beverley played just 11 games before tearing his meniscus and missing the remaining 71 games.
Without the plethora of injuries, it seems as if the Clippers would have been a playoff team last season.
With key players out for large portions of the season, other players had to step up and contribute. Arguably the biggest beneficiary of this situation was Lou Williams. Known as a solid bench scorer, Sweet Lou became L.A.’s primary scoring option and averaged 22.6 points off the bench in a career-high 32.8 minutes per game. Williams’ best moment of the season was when he shocked the basketball world by dropping 50 points on the Golden State Warriors at Oracle Arena.
Montrezl Harrell is another player who deserves to be mentioned as someone who stepped up last season when his name was called. He proceeded to average a career-high 11.0 points and 4.0 rebounds in just 17.0 minutes per game off the bench. The fact that the Clippers still had a productive season despite all of the injuries speaks volumes about the winning culture that the team has implemented.
The Los Angeles Clippers will be a very solid basketball team next season assuming their best players stay healthy. They have a good core along with a deep bench, and this will lead to the Clippers making the playoffs next year.
The Western Conference has certainly improved, but teams like the New Orleans Pelicans, Portland Trail Blazers and Utah Jazz may take steps back next season, which will allow for L.A. to make a run at one of the seeds in the bottom half of the Western Conference playoff bracket.